The Barren
by redcaparanda
Summary: A tyrant King, a lost Crown Princess, and a fae Queen desperate to stop a pointless war. The Lord of Summer is sent to chase a legend across no-mans-land, following whispers of Spirits and miracles into unchartable terrain. But the desert had never been kind, not even to its own, and Lucy supposedly knew better than to save stragglers from the wild magic of the Barren. (NaLu)
1. Chapter 1

**Hello hello! Little author's note here, please skip if you don't care!**

**It's nothing new, I'm sure, but I gotta start a new work off with something. Little live-magic AU for this one. I had the idea to experiment with sentient magic and this is what I got... I have to say, Fairy Tail is the perfect fandom for it. I don't own anything, obviously, except what came out of my head.**

**Please enjoy and drop a review! **

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Lucy stared hard at the thick strip of brown looming on the horizon, daring it to come closer. The dust storm kept tumbling her way at what appeared to be a snail's pace. Reality tended to be distorted by distance like that. Lucy squinted, her forearm shading her eyes, and watched the tiny specks of a rogue camp be swallowed by a raging, relentless mass.

Dust storms were to be expected in the Summer. The desert was a vulnerable, flat spread of tightly packed grit, spider-webbed with cracks and dotted with dried up shrubs. Two wisps of cloud hung lazily in a brilliant blue sky; Lucy averted her eyes until they scurried away. The dust storm trundled on, bubbling like an overflown kettle, promising another round of desert lungs.

From within the storm, a clan horn sounded a long, mournful note. Lucy shook her head and sighed.

"Morons," she muttered. What was the point of sounding the alarm after the storm hit?

The air was light — not a trace of magic in it — and Lucy prayed it would stay that way. She remembered the last time the magic had come out to play. It liked stupid things, and it had toyed with her until it had grown bored; then it had ripped her apart. Her naiveté then wasn't a mistake she cared to repeat.

"Loke?" she called. "Is this one on schedule?"

The spirit of the Lion lifted himself out of a crevice in the ground and dusted off his suit. He looked ridiculous in his crisp black dress suit with a striped red tie. But for all the time Lucy had known him, the outfit never changed; she supposed sand wasn't an issue in the Spirit Realm.

"It's a week and a half early," he said.

"So the pattern doesn't work." Lucy brushed hair out of her eyes and scowled.

"Maybe there isn't a pattern, princess."

"Maybe," she acknowledged. "My life would be easier if there was one."

"Visuals give you a day's warning. That's not enough?"

A strong gust of wind rammed against her, pushing her several steps back. Sand wormed under the tattered scarf covering her head and face. The dust storm suddenly seemed much closer. If the magic hit this one, waiting it out with a Spirit for company might not be an option.

"It's never enough," she said simply.

The storm imploded like a giant taking a big breath, then rolled out in a dozen restless waves. Lucy watched it devour the desert for a moment longer, slightly captivated. Her Spirits couldn't explain the storms. Crux's best suggestion had been the manifestation of something ancient, some form of sentient magic. No one had ideas on what that something might be. Lucy wasn't all that inclined to find out either, for even the vague concept wasn't a pleasant one.

"We should head under. It's moving fast," she said over another punch of wind. Loke indicated the crevice with a mock bow.

"After you, princess."

Lucy lowered herself into the crevice, feeling with her toes for the rough stone that hid under the grit. Her descent was slow and controlled, careful to avoid scrapes or splinters. The wild dust would get into everything and an infection wasn't something she cared to nurse right then.

Loke followed once she was safely out of the way. He took care of securing the wooden board that would protect them from the worst of the dust while Lucy prodded a broken lacrimal to life. It illuminated the bunker in uncertain yellow light. Long shadows flickered across the uneven walls. Half of a narrow spring mattress lay against the far wall, stained brown by the dust. It was thin but didn't quite fit; the corners curled upwards, forming an alcove.

"Isn't this bunker farther out?" Loke leaned against the wall while Lucy unwound her scarf. "You're usually closer to your big secret hoard."

"It's not a hoard. I don't have any gold."

"I once knew a dragon that hoarded iron, not just gold."

Lucy huffed and dropped her pack on the mattress. "There's still gold. That's the traditional thing to hoard. I'll let you know when I find some."

Loke grinned but wasn't deterred. "Why are you so far out?"

"I'm following the southerners," she said. Loke snorted.

"Please. If that was it, you'd be sitting right next to the Vojak, not hiding in the desert. You can't even see them from here."

Lucy shrugged. Telling the truth would probably end in an argument, but lying had never gone over well either, especially not with Loke.

"I was hoping the flock would come through again," she said carefully, "but it's stupid. It's not even the End of Summer yet. I don't know why I bothered."

"Don't say that. Hoping isn't stupid. I don't need to remind you of what the others would say if they were here."

Lucy smiled, slightly bittersweet.

"Did you eat today?" Loke suddenly asked, pushing off the wall. Lucy pursed her lips.

"No."

The frustration on Loke's face told her everything she needed to know. "Lucy, you have to eat. You're thin enough as it is. At some point you're going to fade, and the Barren is going to force my gate shut. I won't be able to do anything!"

"I know that," Lucy said, voice taut and brittle. "But I don't have a backup. I can't afford to splurge until the flock comes through again."

"You know they'll return, they always-"

"No, I don't know! It's been almost a year, you said so yourself. The east lost so many people to famine because they were so certain the flock would return, but now there's nothing to suggest they'll ever come!" Her voice rose a pitch. The wood cover creaked as the first of the storm settled in. "I don't know what I'm going to do if they never come. I don't. I— So just, please, just leave it."

The wood groaned. There was a laden pause, then, "I'm sorry, Lucy."

"I know. It's okay. Thank you for worrying."

"All of us are worrying, Aquarius especially. She's too furious to admit it, but she misses you."

Lucy exhaled forcefully, her mouth curling into a frown. It had been years since she'd summoned any other Spirit but Loke for company. The desert disliked new magic with a dangerous ferocity. Even when her presence had been new and mostly overlooked it had taken a good year for Loke to be allowed without much fuss, but the desert had since grown far more attuned to her summoning. Lucy had found the razor-thin line between life and death and she couldn't risk losing sight of it.

"One day," she said. "Promise."

The effect was immediate but subtle. It was as though a weighted cord had attached itself to Lucy's back, right between her wingblades. Loke frowned disapprovingly. Outside, the howl of the wind gave way to a low thrum, and Lucy's heart sank faster than a boulder.

"Can you tell me the story of the Barren?" she said quietly. Loke gave her a soft smile in lieu of agreement. She curled up on the mattress.

"The desert has always been here, since before the three kingdoms. When the fae first settled in the west, they found the Barren to be an unconquerable force, and they left it alone. When the humans settled the east, they worshipped the Barren. They had no idea that the fae ruled the other side. When the dragons fought over the land, they left the Barren alone because it harbored a magic far more ancient that even the most powerful of drakes. The dragons understood such age to mean unimaginable power. Finally, when the demons made to invade the two established kingdoms, they underestimated the Barren, briefly united the east and west, and paid with their lives.

"The Barren shaped each of the kingdoms, keeping them separate and contained. It defended them against each other. It served as a disposal for unwanted problems and a safe haven for people that needed to run. No patrol will ever chase you past the borders. No one is stupid enough to believe they hold any power in the Barren."

"Some safe haven," Lucy huffed, closing her eyes. Loke chuckled.

"Over time, the people exiled to the desert gathered into four clans. After a brief period of war, the clans came to a miraculous agreement—" Lucy snorted "—and dispersed according to the four points on the compass. Their treaty has held strong for many generations. They developed unique cultures, languages, and dispersal of power. From them sprang many smaller groups and suddenly, the Barren had a people of its own."

Lucy knew the story by heart. A lifetime ago her mother had put it together for her, an intricate tapestry of words held together by legends. It had never ceased to fascinate her.

"As time went on and the dragons made peace with their borders, the kingdoms began to look to the Barren for expansion. It appeared to them as a puzzle that would grant them a weapon beyond anything they could hope to create. To own the Barren was to be unstoppable. They sent people to map the desert, and when many never returned, they began to send armies. The Age of Exploration lasted for hundreds of years. Very few scouts were ever heard from again. The half-a-dozen reports that returned proved unreliable. People were driven mad by their best efforts. They never discovered anything of value. At the end of the Age, a treaty was signed to stop royal expeditions and the spread of land was named the Barren."

The wooden cover creaked loudly in the silence, briefly overpowering the howl of the wind.

"Thanks," Lucy said, opening her eyes.

"Don't mention it, princess."

Outside, the magic swooped down with a violent crackle. Lucy's ears popped. Loke's form flickered translucent for a few seconds. Dust fell from the ceiling in a thick cloud. The slab scraped against the rock as the added pressure dislodged it and Lucy leapt up to push it back into place. Magic brushed icy fingers across Lucy's damaged wings and she shivered.

"Hello to you too," she murmured.

Rapid footsteps thumped overhead. Lucy froze, her shoulder pressed against the wood.

Loke forced a solid form and took on the weight of the cover so Lucy could replace the scarf over her face. When she retook her position, he faded so much that Lucy could see through him.

"It's probably an animal," he said. His voice had a strange cadence to it, as though he was standing much farther away.

"Probably." She strained to hear anything over the wind.

Suddenly, it was as though time had stopped. The silence rang in her ears and she couldn't hear anything, not even her own breathing. Cold horror took her lungs and squeezed. Loke's outline appeared in front of her, furiously mouthing, both hands gesturing down. Lucy dove for the mattress. Her right knee clacked against the ground.

Barely a second later the Barren let loose a piercing shriek. Raw magic rammed into Lucy from above, flattening her to the floor. Loke vanished in a shower of golden sparks. Icy power swept through her body, lighting her nerves on fire. She was turned inside out, unable to breathe, unable to move, her rare magic bare to the world. The stumps of her severed wings ached as they surged outward. The lacrima squeaked and crumbled, throwing the bunker into darkness.

The pressure ebbed as quickly as it had come. Lucy fought to breathe as the excess magic drained from her body. Loke's key warmed against her hip.

"I'm okay," she gasped. "I'm okay."

When she moved it was like crawling through cold soup. Thick magic hung in the air. Lucy held her breath and pushed to her knees, then her feet. The magic swirled to make room, curious. Shaking, Lucy breathed out and extended a hand in front of her, feeling for the wooden slab. She couldn't hear the storm.

T he magic tensed and crashed in one big breath. The pressure vanished. Dust billowed in her face and Lucy sneezed. Suddenly, the shards of the lacrima came alive with golden light. Lucy closed her eyes against the sudden brightness.

"What . . ." Squinting hard, she examined the broken pieces. Then she kicked a small cluster and watched the shards scatter, still glowing with a strength the lacrima had never achieved when it was whole.

Lucy shook her head, mesmerized by the flicker of the shadows. Giving had never been the Barren's style, yet the lights held strong as the dust storm took up a lilting whine. They made the bunker seem warmer and smaller. For a long moment, Lucy might have even believed that she was safe.

A screeching roar shook the ceiling. Another plume of dust swirled in the air. Lucy squeezed her eyes shut to keep them clean and pressed herself against the slab, straining to hear. The magic built up presence again. A low grumble akin to thunder seemed to go right through her, rattling her bones.

Powerful ripples of heat answered. Every nerve in Lucy's body stood on end. The wood against her skin quickly became searing. She barely kept upright as she jerked away. Smoke curled from the slab, closely followed by the smell of burning wood.

Panicking, Lucy pressed herself against the back wall and crouched to fumble in her pack. Aquarius's key bit into her palm. A hysterical laugh bubbled in her throat. She might very well die if the Barren decided that it didn't want to tolerate a water Spirit on its land.

"What have I ever done," she muttered, pulling a pair of too-small goggles over her eyes. The magic rumbled again. Heat flared and the slab gave a loud crack; Lucy winced. The Barren sharpened its magic to a scalpel.

In the next moment, in a second of absolute silence, someone screamed.

The magic crashed like a tidal wave and the sudden cold alone was enough to force the breath from Lucy's chest. She doubled over, wheezing. Every gulp of icy air burned her mouth and throat. Slowly, the storm picked up pace, moaning like a wandering ghoul — and maybe it was a ghoul, for all Lucy knew. The Barren didn't create heat, not even on its good days; but then again, neither did ghouls.

Lucy forced herself to pocket Aquarius's key and used her foot to kick away the slab. It squeaked as it twisted, held by a pinprick of contact. She had a second to gape at the blackened wood before the dust muscled its way in and the slab hit the ground.


	2. Chapter 2

**Boop. Chapter two for your enjoyment. Don't forget to drop a review at the end!**

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The world above was terrifyingly still. The magic held the storm in a iron grip. If Lucy squinted hard enough, she could probably count the particles hovering around her. It was like the Barren had found an interesting toy and had paused the rest of the turmoil so it could get a better look at it.

Scanning the dim oblivion gave up nothing. Lucy's own hands were mere suggestions. If she hadn't been able to feel and move them, she might've dismissed them as an illusion. She took a second to scramble underground and grab a fistful of the glowing lacrima pieces, then dug them into the loose dirt of the crevice. Hopefully they wouldn't get blown away when the storm started up again. Even more hopefully, she'd be able to use their light to find her way back.

Loke would have her hide for this.

She stood tall in the maelstrom of absolute nothing and called out, "Hello?"

For a moment, nothing continued to be her answer. Then the Barren let loose a sour rumble. The ground trembled. Lucy sank her weight into her knees and spread her feet. The keys warmed against her hip in brief flashes. She was too occupied by searching to take the time to tell everyone apart, so she just sent a firm, _I'm fine,_ and took a hesitant step into the cloud of dust.

It was like she'd triggered the end of the world. One second she was surrounded by an impenetrable gloom and the next, a column of brilliant flame split the dim. The sheer power was impressive: the fire reached into the height of the cloud, its hungry fingers threatening to tear everything apart. Lucy felt the Barren recoil from the magic — and it had to be magic, no technology or lacrima could create something as concentrated as this. Then the Barren raised a heavy fist of pure pressure and swatted down on the fire like it was going at a fly with a swatter.

Lucy ran for the base of the column. The fire disappeared without so much as a hiccup of protest, which had to have taken a good chunk of energy out of the idiot casting it. Around her, the storm convulsed with a monstrous breath. The dust bits drifted close together, forming curtains of grit she had to force aside. Her run slowed to a labored jog.

The dim became a true dark. Once every few dozen thuds of her panicking heart, a little blip of flames would skitter across the desert floor. The first time she dismissed them as an illusion. The second and seventh times, she made them her destination. They seemed to be in line with where the column had been, and no matter how much weight the Barren dumped on them, they refused to putter out. Whoever had been stupid enough to bring their magic to the Barren was clearly powerful enough to be overly confident about their abilities.

If she hadn't been a sitting duck, wandering around during a freak storm, Lucy might've thought a little harder about what exactly she was trying to do.

The magic of the Barren swooped down as a scythe. It cut through the packed storm and the dust crashed down in a frantic wave. Powerful volleys of wind slammed into Lucy from all four sides, all at once, and it was like getting squeezed in the prickliest hug of the millennium. She heard her joints pop. As the storm resumed its eerie moaning, the little flames put up one last pitiful burst of power and finally gave out. The storm howled. The all-encompassing magic sat down on top of them once more for good measure, then happily moved on.

The pressure lifted. The storm stirred up a little extra havoc, nearly sweeping Lucy off her feet. She crouched low and checked to make sure the little weights sewn into her belt were secure. Getting carried away by a sudden gust of playful wind wasn't something she cared to experience again.

Something big crashed into her from behind. The force took her off her feet and sent her tumbling up a soft slope that definitely hadn't been there before. Sometimes, the magic moved the ground around. Usually, that meant that whatever strategic position had been occupied by Lucy's bunker before the storm was gone. She didn't like being at the bottom of hills and valleys. Once the sky cleared up, she would have to move.

Maybe Loke had been right. Maybe she should swallow her pride and go to see the clansmen. It would make Maria Sergeyevna happy, if anything.

_First things first. Focus, Lucy,_ she told herself. She pushed up on her arms and scanned the gloom for the little pinpricks of lacrima lights. Ever so faint, they caught her eye and pulled a sigh of relief from her tense lungs. Then she did a quick self-scan. Aside from what were sure to be some lovely bruises, she was fine. Since her body and head were right where they should be, she stuck out her arms and blindly searched for whatever had collided with her.

Two steps later, she tripped over what felt an awful lot like a body. One of her knees hit what might be their ribs. She scrambled backwards, heart in her throat and the horrid shriek of the wind in her ears. Loke had been wrong. She bit down on her lip as her blind probe discovered a distinct face, neck, and chest. A man, most likely, and with common features. The lack of clothing concerned her more than anything. If she left them out in the storm as they were, they were as likely to get buried alive or smothered to death as they were to get eaten.

_"__Wild animal,"_ Loke had said. He'd been so wrong.

She looped her arms under their armpits and dragged them towards the guiding lights. Little prayers got stuck to the roof of her dry mouth. _Don't blink out,_ she thought desperately. Each step was becoming harder than the one before it. The wind pulled at her clothes, almost at her skin. If she gave it even half a chance, it would probably pull her bones out of her body and scatter them to the four corners of the desert. _Please don't blink out on me._

Too focused on not getting blown away again, Lucy nearly fell into the crevice of her bunker. It's like the lights had crept up on her while she'd been preoccupied — and maybe they had. The Barren wreaked havoc with everything in its possession. Creating mountains out of molehills was child's play. Moving her bunker just a few feet closer than it should have been was probably about as taxing as a blink. But her wings weren't pulling at her spine, caught up in a memory that the ancient magic had stirred up. Aside from the push-pull of the wind and the monstrous waves of grit and sand, the magical pressure was so faint it could be dismissed as nothing. So Lucy scowled down at the ground, maneuvered the limp body into the crevice, and quickly scrambled down after it. Instantly, the force of the storm died down just enough for her to catch a breath.

But she wasn't safe. Not now, not ever, and especially not out in the open. Just because the storm was too much for her human body didn't mean the rest of the monsters weren't out, and they would be as drawn by the flames as she had been. So she dragged the body — and it was definitely maybe a human body, at least at first glance — into her bunker. Then she heaved up the plank and hammered it into place with her fists. A splinter sank into her pinky finger.

Lucy gingerly lay the man flat and stepped away, then returned her goggles to her pack and wiped her dusty palms on her pants. He wasn't much taller than her but the muscle and scars on his bare arms definitely raised concern, not to mention the raw power of his flames. In a contest of strength, he would probably overpower her once he walked off the Barren's attack.

But that was if he woke up at all. The flyswatter of power had definitely been aimed at him: his face had a lovely ashen tilt and cold sweat had glued the dust to his skin. Lucy knew the classic signs of magic deficiency like the back of her own hand. It would take a miracle and a half for the man to sit up without excruciating pain. Still, she took a deep breath and quickly checked for any weaponry she could repurpose - he had nothing with him, not even spare rations or a canteen, no pack to speak of - then lifted one of his shoulders to double-check for wings. All she found was the smooth edge of the wingblade.

Sitting back on her heels, Lucy frowned as she looked him over again. He had a sharp face and the bulk of a well-fed man. His simple clothes were reminiscent of the northern clansmen, yet he was missing a lot from the traditional ensemble and they looked almost new. The dust and grime caking him could be easily beaten out of the too-soft cotton. And when she looked closer, bitterly comparing his skin with hers, Lucy realized he was simply too clean to be a clansman.

"Not a deserter, then," she murmured, as though saying it out loud might lead to some epiphany. "No wings, so not fae . . . no horns, no . . ."

She pinched the bridge of her nose. The column of fire had been the work of a magic creature, no question, but the man appeared human. He wasn't of the Barren, wasn't a clansman, and Lucy had no idea which kingdom to put him in.

"A halfling?" she said as she drew Loke's key. "But he'd be too powerful, wouldn't he?"

Loke materialized barely enough to have a spectral shape. Lucy winced apologetically. Then Loke saw the man, and the anger that surged through him nearly knocked him back into the Celestial Plain.

"Stay away from him, Lucy! Do you hear me? Get away—"

Loke's gate snapped shut. The backlash forced Lucy to all fours, her vision swimming and a steady throb building behind her eyes.

Beside her, the man groaned low in his throat. Lucy scrambled backwards, nearly biting her tongue in half. The headache hammered away at her skull. Her back hit the wood slab hard enough to dislodge it. There was a loud, angry scraping noise followed by a violent spray of dust as the storm pushed its way inside. The man jerked, seemingly trying to sit up but finding it too painful, and sneezed twice.

Lucy shot to her feet and quickly shouldered the slab back into place, then closed her eyes and leaned against it.

"Where . . . where are my friends?" the man rasped, his voice drier than the Barren itself and cracking with raw, unfiltered _hurt._

Lucy rubbed her temples. "I have no idea."

That would not have been her first question, if she'd been in his place.

The man wasn't supposed to have woken up for another half-day, or more, and by that time Lucy was supposed to have jumped ship to another bunker. She had no idea how long the storm would last. She certainly had no intention of spending that time with a strange man that apparently healed much faster than a human, especially if he turned out to be an outsider. That was too much of a risk to take. Not to mention that she was rationing; she just didn't have enough supplies to care for another person.

When she opened her eyes just enough to see, the man was running a trembling hand across the wall. His fingers found a small ledge and secured a grip. Then, slowly and noisily, he hauled himself up into a sitting position and immediately slumped sideways.

Lucy watched him with a small frown. She took note of his gritted teeth and their unnatural edge, but more concerning was his discipline — she knew how much pain he should be in, and to sit up was no small feat. Sitting up in his condition took too much strength. He still looked like death warmed over, but it just didn't seem to be enough to stop him.

The man raised his head enough to meet her eyes and bared his teeth; even a child would understand that as a challenge. Lucy's frown tightened.

"Where are my friends?" he repeated, much stronger the second time around. Apparently he'd gotten rid of the frog in his throat.

"I don't know."

"Where am I?"

Lucy mulled over her answer, then indicated the bunker and said, "Underground."

The man scowled at her. There was something unsettling about his unblinking stare, an intensity that threatened to lash out as raw power. He projected danger. If Lucy had to guess, there most definitely was some demon in there. But he didn't have the physical features, and demon-fae hybrids were unheard of. They simply didn't exist.

Yet he'd come to the Barren, the one place where no one would dare come after him, and that spoke volumes on its own.

"What are you?" she said under her breath, thinking the howl of the storm would mask her words. The man's eyebrows inched upwards with an air of disbelief.

"Haven't heard that one in a while," he said. "Where are we? Are we still in the Barren?"

So he had some measure of enhanced hearing. "Still...?"

But the man didn't seem inclined to keep going. His eyes flickered as he scoped out the tiny bunker; it only took him a couple seconds to return to her face, the little that he could see through the gap in her tattered scarf. Little beads of sweat crawled down her forehead.

The corner of the man's mouth twitched downwards. Lucy pressed her sticky palms against the slab behind her and forced a deep breath through her nose, then reached with her magic. The Gate of the Bull crept open, just a hair, just enough to force Lucy's physical problems away. The Barren puffed up like an angry cat. The magical pressure, which had been barely tangible since it had released the storm and traipsed away, suddenly turned suffocating.

The man hunched over his legs, his face twisted with pain.

The Barren wound around her, curious but still hostile. Out of all the spirits, it was most accustomed to Loke, who could take on the brunt of the summoning himself and oftentimes appeared using his own power. It knew how easily he could be crushed. But while Lucy had connected with Taurus before, it had never been when the magic was this alert. Belatedly, she considered that relief from the thunder in her head might not be worth upsetting an ancient power.

Lucy held her breath as the Barren grumbled, the sound rolling through the ground and sprinkling her with dust, before coiling and settling down. The pressure didn't lessen, however. She was treading one of the finest lines.

"Was that you?" the man demanded hoarsely. "What did you do?"

"I don't know," Lucy muttered. At least with the headache pushed away, she could figure out a plan.

"You did _something_. I felt the thing freak out."

"Very observant of you," she hissed. "You want answers, you start by giving me some."

The man sat up enough to properly glower at her. A jolt of adrenaline rushed down Lucy's spine. She wanted to know what was in his blood. She also didn't want to ask.

"I'm working for the Fae Queen," the man said, and Lucy immediately dismissed the possibility of demonic heritage. But then what? "There are two other members in my group. Where are they?"

"One for one? Really?"

"Yeah. Humor me."

Lucy wrinkled her nose. She never had finished her diplomacy studies. If she'd held out even one more year, she would have learned how to negotiate with foreign dignitaries. Maybe, maybe.

She would've also been dead, and so that wasn't a maybe she got hung up on often.

"I have no idea," is what she settled on.

"I don't believe you."

"Really isn't my concern, since that's my answer."

The wood at her back groaned. The man sneezed once again and grunted, fingers twitching towards his ribs.

"It hurts less if you lie down," Lucy offered quietly. "You didn't do yourself any favors by picking a fight."

"I'm not giving in to a crusty patch of grass," the man said.

"There isn't any grass for a few miles anyway. Lie down. Stop making yourself miserable." Lucy pounded on the slab a few times to make sure it was secure against the arch of the bunker's walls. The back of her shirt stuck to her skin. Beads of sweat soaked into her scarf. Briefly, while she watched the man struggle to get his legs under himself, a vein twitching in his tightly clenched jaw, Lucy wondered if he was generating the heat. The flames were probably his, after all. But if he was a fae, then where were his wings?

"Okay. At least stop trying to make it worse," she said. The man got one foot flat on the ground. His face was so carefully set that it might have been carved in stone.

"You can ask a question for free, if you stop trying to get up," she finally relented, hands held up in a gesture of peace. She didn't know if it was her concession or the slightly terrified pitch of her voice that had the man pause, but Lucy got what she wanted. He slumped against the wall with a heavy exhale and a pained grimace.

"You heal really, _really_ fast," Lucy muttered. The man snorted, one eyebrow twitching up. Lucy shrugged, her palms twisting in a shrug, and added, "And you have an unhealthy dose of stubborn or stupid. Which one exactly remains to be seen."

"I thought you said _I_ could ask a question," the man said.

"I'm not asking, just observing. But go ahead."

"Who are you and where are we?"

"That's two questions." Lucy pulled her scarf under her chin to get the dusty fabric out of her mouth, then discreetly patted at the sweat gathered at her throat. The magical pressure hadn't lessened since she'd opened the Gate of the Bull. If the man was generating the heat, it was very bizarre for the Barren to tolerate foreign magic for so long. Staying underground could very well suffocate her, or the Barren would simply throw a fit and crush both of them.

"And you have every advantage over me right now," the man said. Lucy understood the insinuation as though he'd spoken it out loud.

She pursed her lips. "No. I hope your Queen has a good reason for sending you here on a suicide run. Would you care to elaborate?"

"Where is here?"

"The Barren. I thought that much was obvious."

"Where is here exactly?" the man tried. Lucy was not impressed.

"I don't know. It's not like we've got cities out here, so you tell me. Where did you think you were going?"

There was a slight shift in the man's face, so minuscule that if Lucy hadn't been completely focused on him as a threat, she would have certainly missed it. Maybe he was going to try and be crafty. She could deal with crafty so long as it didn't blow up in her face, and if he tried to be crafty for long enough, she could feed him to the southern guard.

"We're tracking celestial magic that the . . . _one of_ the Guilds mapped out. It's probably a summoner fae, someone who can open Celestial Gates. We're trying to find them," he said. His eyes never once left her face.

"Then you're too far south," Lucy said bluntly as she swallowed down a large chunk of numbing fear. It was too damn hot in the little bunker. "The fae travel further northwest. It's only humans around here."

"So you're human."

Lucy raised a brow. "Obviously."

"If you knew who we were searching for, you wouldn't tell me."

Lucy didn't bother with an answer. Instead, she focused on staring at the corner of the man's left eye so that she could pretend to be maintaining eye contact without having to deal with the hungry power writhing in his red gaze. Briefly, she seriously considered him being a magical hybrid, but of what?

Suddenly, the Barren coiled away. Barely a second later the power lashed out as a titanic whip of raw strength. Lucy was thrown to the ground, her head ricocheting with a dull crack, every nerve on fire from the ceaseless pressure. Taurus's gate clicked shut. All of her aches and pains came surging back. The left side of her body numbed from the impact while the right stung, almost as though the whip had bit into her skin like a blade.

Where the strange heat was annoying before, it instantly became scalding, and a low rumble shook the ground as though in response. Lucy gagged on the too-hot air. The Barren's magic chilled so quickly that it pulled the breath out of Lucy's chest, leaving her choking and gasping for even a lungful. Dust coated her mouth. Through hazy eyes, she realized the Barren's attack had split the ground in half, leaving the bunker completely bare to the storm above.

Weak movement flickered in her peripheral. Hacking coughs rattled her ribs as she pushed herself to sit, the world a stingy brown slur. She pulled her scarf up to cover her mouth and closed her eyes. Then she shakily unwound the ties on her pack and groped for her goggles, desperately praying they hadn't been shattered by her fall. A muffled curse escaped her as her fingers snagged on a crack in one of the lenses; the other was mercifully intact.

With one eye open, Lucy blinked the worst of her dizziness away in time to see the man stumble, his hands at his throat and teeth stupidly bared in a useless snarl. The Barren rumbled and reared back to slap them again. Lucy quickly flattened herself to the ground. The man instead leapt forward, pitiful tendrils of flame curling from his skin, and was flung back down for his efforts.

The Barren did not let them go this time; finally irritated by the man's magic, it had decided teach him a lesson he would never forget. It did not particularly care if he happened to die in the process.

Lucy found she cared, especially since her body was stranded too close to his. She had no intention of dying as collateral damage.

The gritty floor cut into her arm as she reached for her keys. Working blind, she separated the keys of the Maid, the Crab, and the Twins. Each gate had to be pried open. But once the Spirits stood beside her, Lucy felt the Barren pause long enough to examine the magic she had brought to the table. The pressure did not lessen.

She had a split second to again wonder what exactly she was trying to accomplish. Did she really think something as massive as the desert would notice three mere pinpricks of magic, much less yield to them? That it would care long enough to notice how similar they were to Loke?

"Princess, do not strain yourself!" Virgo hissed. She clearly had no illusions as to what Lucy was hoping to do. "Summon a silver Gate!"

Lucy grit her teeth, gripped Sagittarius's key, and felt her stomach lurch as she croaked, "Open, Gate of the Archer: Sagittarius!"

The strain of holding four golden Gates open tore at her body. The stumps of her wings ached as they fought to extend, to help her bear the burden of her summoning, but only tore at stiff muscles that hadn't been properly used in years. Lucy felt as though she'd lodged herself between the doors and was slowly being ground into nothing as she delayed their closing by mere insignificant seconds.

The Barren would around her like a serpent. Her wings throbbed. For a second her mind went blank as mind-splitting pain coursed through her, her body a live wire, and then everything stilled. Dust floated down, suddenly bereft with no gale-force winds to drive the storm. The aggressive magic drifted upwards like a stray breeze. Blinding light tore through her watery vision and she reflexively squeezed her eyes shut. Even then, she could see the blistering sunlight of just past midday reclaiming what had been hidden by the storm. The combination of the usual chill of the open desert and the warm sun felt so, _so nice_ after the suffocating darkness of the little bunker.

Lucy teetered sideways, confused and disoriented, her skin aching like one big bruise. The man lay unmoving under a little overhang that had survived the splitting of the earth. Her feet crossed over and she barely caught herself on the crumbling walls. Her white-knuckled grip on her keys went slack. She hissed a few choice words as they clattered to the ground, then went to pick them up. Instead, she sat down next to them, put her back to the wall — just for a second, everything _hurt_ — and passed out.

* * *

**Yes, Maria Sergeyevna is a Russian name. Who she is (besides an OC) will be revealed in later chapters. **

**Rate and review, pretty please!**

**Till next time.**


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